Erasing Memory Hardback - 2011

It was the same as it always was, chamber music driving up and jazz driving back. But this time he’d asked her, “Why do you want to be buried so far from town?” Kate had smiled and closed her eyes—for such a while that he thought she’d fallen asleep—then softly, but with some strength, as if to ensure that the point made it through the haze of morphine and fatigue, she said, “It’s beautiful there. It’s a lovely drive. Not too far. I know you’ll visit. And”—breathing deeply—“if it was in the city, I doubt you would. Anyway, it’ll get you out of your head for a few hours.” She was right. He’d been up once a month for the past thirty-eight months. When he’d looked at her ashes, he couldn’t see the difference between them and the ashes he retrieved from the fireplace to sprinkle on the garden—he couldn’t reassemble her. And yet, below the ground, beneath a headstone that bore only her initials, KGWM, he could imagine her on her side with her legs slightly tucked up—asleep.  And it did get him out of his head. A cemetery in the city could never do that—the sound of sirens, the headstones of people they’d known, the buzz of traffic nearby would distract from the solace of being near her.

He stayed this time, as always, past sundown, reading, watching for birds and announcing each out loud for the odd comfort it gave him—cedar waxwing, swallow, cardinal, chickadee, a rare ruby-throated hummingbird—not because he truly believed she would hear, but because he didn’t entirely disbelieve it. The kitchen of Martha’s Truck Stop stayed open till ten, and on the way back he stopped and ordered the same thing he always did: a hot beef sandwich with gravy, no fries, followed by apple pie and coffee.

He was just cresting the Canadian Shield above Lake Charles when the call came over the radio. “All units. All units. We have an anonymous call about a fatality in a beach house on Shore Road, Lake Charles.”

MacNeice pressed the hands-free button. “The caller—male or female?”

“Male. Over.”

“Did he sound agitated, Sylvia?”

“No, Mac. Cool as a cucumber, not hurried or concerned. Over.”

“Describe his voice—north-end, west-end, local, foreign?”

“I’d say foreign, but very educated in English. You can judge for yourself when you hear it. Over.”

“Thanks, Syl. I’m about five minutes away from the cut-off to Lake Charles.”

"For crime fiction junkies, Scott Thornley's first novel, Erasing Memory, a beautifully written police procedural set in a fictional version of Hamilton, just whets our appetite for more. Our hero, senior homicide detective Mac MacNeice, a literate and complex man, who may remind the reader of Peter Robinson's beloved Inspector Banks, runs an interesting team of investigators dealing with a truly weird murder. Please tell me this is the first of a series."
--Stevie Cameron, author of On the Farm: Robert William Pickton and the Tragic Story of Vancouver's Missing Women

"Beginning with a murder unlike any you've ever imagined--or would want to--Scott Thornley spins a gripping tale whose heroes and villains are equally and refreshingly human."
--Howard Shrier, author of High Chicago

SCOTT THORNLEY has had a diverse career, from designing the Gemini Award for the Academy of Canadian Television to the logos for Mary Poppins and The Little Mermaid. As president and creative director of Scott Thornley + Company (a strategic creative firm that defines, builds and maintains the brands of clients in Canada, the United States and Great Britain), Thornley has worked for twenty years with the pillars of the Canadian and international cultural and scientific communities in the field of applied storytelling. Having won over 150 international awards for design, he was inducted into the Royal Canadian Academy of the Arts in 1990. His interests also include drawing and photography--both of which he has exhibited.